Love at first sight at the Utah Hockey Club's first NHL game

SALT LAKE CITY – Buzz. Annoy. Excitement. Fit checks. Eager to impress. The kind of energy that only a highly anticipated, curious introduction can generate.

Watching the Utah Hockey Club's opening game Tuesday night through the lens of thousands attending their first NHL game was a little like witnessing a first blind date from across a coffee shop.

Utah, get to know your hockey club – and the NHL.

Hockey Club, get to know your new home.

There was no shortage of the usual first date questions: What would the Delta Center look like? What will her personality be like? Will it be uncomfortable at all? Will they get along?

And then 7-foot-10 Jazz All-Star Lauri Markkanen skated to deliver the ceremonial puck, shaking hands with another major professional sport in Utah and sparking a budding romance.

Everyone may have held their breath because Captain Clayton Keller revealed during a morning rehearsal that the Finnish-born Markkanen had fallen on the ice, but Markkanen met the moment and glided around with ease. The crowd at the Delta Center roared and Keller came in for the faceoff.

And Dylan Guenther scored two goals and led Utah to its first 5-2 victory over the Chicago Blackhawks.

“Something I will remember forever,” Keller said.

The beauty of this romance, after inheriting the fragile heart of a defeated Arizona Coyotes franchise, is that it seems destined to last.

“It feels like we caught each other at the perfect moment,” Utah Hockey Club co-owner Ashley Smith said Tuesday.

It was an unforgettable night – for the former Coyotes, for the proud Utahns and, last but not least, for the NHL itself. The NHL is now, at least for now, complete with 32 teams – no longer 31.5. For most of Commissioner Gary Bettman's 31-year tenure, he was forced to play the role of a part-time firefighter, putting out fires at various troubled franchises. The NHL map has never been stronger.

What the NHL and owners Ryan and Ashley Smith accomplished in five and a half months, from takeover to puck drop, was nothing short of incredible. Somehow the NHL has transferred a problem to an emerging, young market that meets all the demographic criteria in hockey.

Utah sold 8,500 all-season pass equivalents. On opening night, they doubled the record for merchandise sold in a single day – and there isn't even a team name or logo. Fans drank beer in notoriously buttoned-up Salt Lake City, setting a Delta Center record for most beer sold ($120,000) during an NBA or NHL game.

“I’ve always believed the NHL belongs here,” Bettman said. “That just confirms it.”

Utah is on track to be among the NHL's top 20 in both ticket sales and merchandise, said Chris Armstrong, president of hockey operations. That means 11,131 people were counted – the number of seats with a clear view – and not the 16,020 who entered the building and occupied every seat.

“I didn’t know what to expect,” Blackhawks captain Nick Foligno said. “To be honest, I heard great things and it lived up to the hype. They were loud, they were full of energy and you could tell they were happy to have hockey here.”

Less than six months ago, the Smiths stood in front of the Coyotes players and delivered the news: “You’ve been traded to Utah,” Ryan Smith said.

It was a whirlwind. They have reimagined a temporary practice facility at the Utah Olympic Oval, while construction is underway on a gleaming permanent practice palace in suburban Sandy, Utah. They had to reorient and adapt the Delta Center to accommodate the basketball-first Delta Center.

But when you look past the attention-grabbing photos of the restricted-view seats, it's easy to see that it all fits together. A $900 million renovation of the arena is planned over the next three offseasons that will transform the Delta Center into a world-class NHL arena with excellent viewing conditions – and the site of the 2034 Winter Olympic Ice Hockey Tournament. The Utah Hockey Club is not NHL novelty; It's the real deal.

“It won't be perfect. We’re not going to do everything right and we’re going to make mistakes,” Ashley Smith said. “It's going to take a while.”

Despite their best intentions, the coyotes wandered the desert for nearly two decades, and it took until Tuesday before they finally had their moment in the sun.

Gone are the distractions of playing in a 4,000-seat college arena that was half-filled with opposing fans most nights. And the feeling of playing in the majors for a second-tier minor league franchise. And no basic NHL-level treatment, like high-end hotels on the street and proper nutrition.

The bar was low. The former Coyotes, 17 of whom were on the roster last season, walked into a sparkling new locker room for the first time Tuesday and are grateful.

“It was on a whole different level,” Keller said. “It's a completely different feeling, I think it freed us a little bit. We can concentrate on our work and it’s good to have no distractions.”

That’s why the Utah team’s motto this year is “All-In, No Excuses.” You can just play now. They are uniquely positioned for both the present and the future and are ready to compete for a playoff spot after years of disciplined building. Utah has the third-most cap space in the league, two true top lines with young stars, a full slate of draft picks, and so many prospects in their system that the 50-contract limit forces them to be careful with whom they choose Sign. GM Bill Armstrong admitted that contending teams are already starting to chase players on their prospect list, even though they know not all of them can stay.

“It’s a pretty good problem to have,” Armstrong said with a smile.

Given the frantic sprint to opening night, Ryan Smith said he hoped he could take a second on Tuesday to sit back and realize: “This is a moment.”

It had to be a pinching moment for the cool, backwards billionaire in the hat. You did it. He sat on a couch next to Bettman, with Dwayne Wade and Shaboozey nearby and a slew of other Utah celebrities in their orbit. And they watched NHL hockey in makeshift uniforms, with UTAH on top taking on the legendary Original Six Blackhawks.

Looking around, this makeshift arena setup was completely imperfect. Fans without any emotional connection to these players may not have known who exactly to root for other than Liam “Spicy Tuna” O’Brien. They were still learning the rhythm of the goal chant and grasping the flow of the game.

But hearing that organic “U-Tah!” singing and seeing the joy of new converts experiencing the best live sport in the world for the first time, well, it felt like seeing love at first sight.

“It was a hell of a journey,” said coach Andre Tourigny. “One day we will look back – we were part of it.”

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POST SPONSORED BY bet365

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